C.S. Lewis says it’s a good idea to read old books. He says every age sees certain truths and makes certain mistakes. Whether you’re a Christian or atheist or anything else, to be part of any given age is to share certain blind spots, and one of the best ways to see what you’re blind to is to read things from other ages, when they saw other things.

He wrote that in his introduction to some of Athanasius’ writings, one of the guys who was a part of the early Church (4th century). Athanasius did a lot of work to help the Church think about the Trinity, among other things, and I spent some time last summer reading his and other writings on the topic. And just like Lewis promised, I discovered a blind spot in my vision.

When we talk about our relationship with Christ today, we usually say that He is in us. We invite Jesus into our hearts. We have Christ in us. God is in our lives, etc., etc. And that’s fair because you can find language about Christ being in us in the Bible.

But there’s other language in the Bible that we don’t seem to use as much, and it’s the preferred language for guys like Athanasius.